Business

Microsoft wants to revive your dead loved ones as chatbots and maybe holograms

I hate it here.

by
Josiah Motley
January 22, 2021

Image: Vice

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Apparently, we’re starting 2021 with the idea of bringing loved ones past (passed?) back through the use of chatbots. This comes from a new patent that Microsoft was granted, and reported on by The Independent.

The patent’s premise is “creating a conversational chat bot of a specific person.” While this could obviously mean celebrities and other iconic people, the patent makes it clear that it could also be acquaintances, friends, and more.

“The specific person [who the chat bot represents] may correspond to a past or present entity (or a version thereof), such as a friend, a relative, an acquaintance, a celebrity, a fictional character, a historical figure, a random entity, etc.”

These chatbots from Microsoft would be created by scrapping data, social media posts, text messages, and more to create a realistic, digital version of the person being represented.

In addition, the patent also mentions using audio and images of the person to create audio models for the bot, as well as 2D and 3D representations of the person.

The whole thing is a bit creepy, personally, but I could see people being interested in this type of tech. Even if it was just applied towards celebrities and other influential people. Black Mirror, anyone?

Is this something you would consider doing? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.